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[video] Paula Deen Defends Southern Feelings Toward Slavery

She is looking for some sympathy because her father blew his head off after the way because his precious slaves no longer were available to make them rich. Somebody get Oprah on the phone to see how she feels about all of this. Paula Deen needs to buried along with her pro-slavery philosophy.

Last fall, I visited the New York Times headquarters to see Paula Deen talk with Times reporter Kim Severson on a variety of topics. When I wrote it up, I focused mostly on her comments about her diabetes, because Deen’s endorsement of the diabetes drug Victoza was still hot news. But I also briefly mentioned a strange segment of the talk in which she talked about Southern attitudes toward race. Today, all this talk of her recent racist comments spurred me to revisit the video of the TimesTalk. It’s really shocking stuff. Watch the video at the top of this entry for our race-related highlights.

Severson first broaches the topic of race relations after showing a clip from Deen’s appearance on “Who Do You Think You Are,” in which she visits a large plantation a distant ancestor of hers named Billy had owned. (Along with 30 slaves.) That prompts Deen to talk about the Civil War and the Antebellum South.

Though she ultimately says that the abolition of slavery was a “terrific change,” she also takes some time to defend the practice. She says, back then, “black folk were such integral part of our lives, they were like our family,” and, for that reason, “we didn’t see ourselves as being prejudiced.” (The first person plural here raises the question: did Paula Deen herself live in the Antebellum South? Is she a vampire?)It’s also worth noting that she takes care not to refer to slaves as “slaves.” She generally calls them “these people” or “workers.”